In the Arms of a Stranger (6 page)

Bri weighed out her options.
  The only one who could swear it was a lie was Jake and what good would that do?  In order to dispute Chad’s claim, Jake would have to admit he’d slept with her without even knowing her name.  No one would believe there was a mix up with the rooms or that she’d honestly thought she was sleeping with Chad.  On the other hand, what good would saving her reputation do if she had to spend the rest of her life bound to a man she hated?

Brianne shook her head.
  “No, I won’t do it.”

“You listen
to me,” he ground out menacingly, “it’s not just your life you’ll be destroying.  How do you think your doting Daddy will take it when he learns his little girl has been sleeping around like a common tramp?”

“He won’t believe a word of it and neither will my mother!”

Chad shrugged.  “Maybe not, but his friends will, and so will his business associates.  Phillip is a highly respected man, but all that will change when rumors of his daughter’s loose morals start spreading around.  He’ll be ashamed of you and he certainly won’t be able to keep you on as his Public Relations Director.”

Fresh tears pooled in her eyes
.  If she only had herself to worry about, Bri would have dealt with it, but she simply couldn’t bear to disappoint her parents with something so torrid.  Bri slumped against the sofa, defeated.  What choice did she have?

Chad leaned down and kissed her on the cheek.
  “That’s my girl.  I’ll call you when I get back to the coast and let you know when I’ll be returning for a visit.  Who knows, maybe we can finish what we started?”

Bri turned her head away from him, stubbornly refusing to break down until after he left the room.
  It hit her hard; the mess she’d made of her own life, the potential disaster she would make of her parent’s life if she didn’t marry Chad.  But what really twisted her insides was knowing that any dreams she had about being with Jake would remain just that.  She’d sat on the fence too long, unable to decide if she should call off the wedding or not.  Now the decision had been made for her.  Bri buried her face in her hands, crying her heart out and hating herself for doing it. 

Sobbing
so hard she didn’t hear the incessant rapping on the door or the soft click as the card key triggered the latch, Bri was taken totally by surprise when she was suddenly scooped up off the sofa and into a pair of strong arms.  She clung to Jake’s neck, crying even harder because she’d needed him so badly and now he was here, hugging her to his chest as if he would never let her go. 

“I’m sorry,” he said thickly.
  “God, honey, I never meant to hurt you.” 

He held her to him, whispering heartfelt apologies and pressing soft kisses to her temple until the soothing tone of his voice reached past the misery and gradually put an end to her tears.
  She felt foolish, crying like baby and latching onto him as if he was some sort of life line, but she couldn’t seem to help herself.  Weak and vulnerable were not words that had ever been associated with the name Brianne Carrington, but it was a pretty apt description of how she viewed herself at the moment.  It didn’t help that Jake was cradling her to him as if she was made of glass.  Even while it made her feel safe and protected, it also heightened the horrible sense of helplessness that seemed to have a strangle hold on her.

“I’m sorry,” she finally said.
  “I don’t usually fall to pieces like this.”

“It’s my fault for being such an insensitive ass.”

Bri shook her head.  “Oh Jake, I’m sorry for making you think…I mean, I was a little hurt by what you said but that’s not why I was so upset.”

His expression hardened.
  “I see, it’s because of Chad, isn’t it?”

“Well…yes
.  How did you know?”

He lowered her feet to the floor, the gentleness in his voice changing abruptly to match the icy stare he was giving her.
  “I must be the biggest fool of all time.  Here I am thinking you cared enough for me that my remarks about your clothes made you cry and the whole time you were sobbing your heart out because Chad was leaving today.”

He let loose of her so fast, Brianne stumbled back a few steps before catching herself.
  She turned away from him, clutching the torn pieces of her blouse and pulling them together.  Maybe it was best if he thought she was so in love with Chad she’d been heartbroken when he had to leave.  It wasn’t as if she and Jake had a future together, and at least this way he was certain to keep his distance and she wouldn’t be tempted to give in to her own desires.  She couldn’t bring herself to lie so blatantly when just thinking of Chad made the bile rise in her throat, so she did the next best thing to convince Jake that what he’d said was true.

“I need to be alone for a few minutes.
  If you could tell Daddy I’ll be down in time for the first meeting, I would appreciate it.”

He stood there for several minutes, staring at her back, wondering how he could have been so wrong about her feelings for him.
  Anger mixed with the sharp pain in his chest.  It gnawed at his gut that she might truly love Chad if his departure brought on this kind of an emotional outburst, but Jake couldn’t shake the feeling there was more to this than met the eye.  She hadn’t denied Chad’s leaving was the cause for all the waterworks, but her response was hardly confirmation of it either.

“What’s really going on here, Bri?”

Her shoulder’s stiffened.  “Wh-what do you mean?”

“You’re not the type of woman who suffers from separation anxiety, especially when there doesn’t seem to be much of an attachment to begin with.”

Brianne forced a harsh tone.  “You don’t even know me, Jake, so don’t presume to understand what my relationship with Chad is like.  Just because he doesn’t like public displays of affection doesn’t mean he’s not a k-kind and l-loving man.”

“Kind and loving?
  Come on, honey, you’re practically choking on the words!  He said something, didn’t he?  He belittled you again just like he always does but this time it must have been worse than usual.”  He reached out, resting his hands lightly on her shoulders.  “Talk to me, Bri.  What did he say that upset you so bad?”

She squeezed her eyes shut, ashamed at how easily Chad had broken her and how effortlessly he had crushed the life out of her
.  He’d turned her into this spineless, nothing of a person, and she was appalled by it.  Where was her fighting spirit?  Where was the woman who never gave up, never gave in, never let anyone tell her how to live her life? 

Chad had stolen that from her, she thought bitterly.
  He’d spent the last six months systematically tearing down her strong will and she hadn’t suspected a thing.  No, that wasn’t entirely true.  She knew it was happening, she just hadn’t realized how cold and calculating Chad had been in doing it.  She’d made excuses for him, told herself he was just old fashioned and that giving in to him was an expression of her love.  Well, she’d made her bed and now she would literally have to lie in it, even if it turned her stomach to do so.

“Please, Jake…just go.”

“Not until you talk to me.”

“I don’t want to talk
.  I want to be left alone.”

“Well, that’s just too bad because I’m not leaving until you do.”
 

In exasperation, Brianne turned around to face him.
  “This has nothing to do with you, why can’t you accept that?  I’m not your problem, Jake, so please, please go away!”

Defeat dulled the handsome features of his face.
  “If that’s what you really want.”

“It is,” she insisted.
 

Her heart lodged in her throat when he nodded and turned to go
.  And though everything inside of her cried out for him to stay, she remained staunchly silent.  His steps were slow, reluctant, and Bri held her breath until he finally reached the door and put his hand on the knob.  Her arms fell to her sides, the ache in her heart so piercing it was a wonder she didn’t crumble to the ground from the pain of it.  A strangled sob tore from her throat, and even though she knew he couldn’t possibly have heard it from across the room, Jake spun around as if she’d hollered out to him. 

Uncontrollable rage ripped through Jake when his eyes fell on the shredded remains of her blouse.
  He stormed back into the room and towered over her, his anger so intense his whole body shook with it.  Bri shrank away from, making a frantic effort pull the material together as if that would somehow make it better.  It didn’t.  He was furious.  Furious at Chad for doing this to her and furious at Bri for trying to hide it.

Jake gripped her wrists and pulled them away from the blouse.
  “What happened?”

“Nothing…I did it.”
 She tried to wrestle free but he had a vice like hold on her and obviously had no intention of letting her go.  Her eyes met his challengingly.  “I was upset…because of what you said, so I…I tore it myself and…”

Jakes eyes narrowed dangerously.
  “Don’t you dare try to cover up for that coward!”

The murderous look on his face frightened her even though Bri knew it wasn’t directed her.
  What if he told her father?  Phillip Carrington would be every bit as outraged as Jake was and wouldn’t think twice about beating Chad within an inch of his life for what he’d done.  She couldn’t take the chance that Chad would spew his bag of lies once her father finished with him, and who knew what other revenge he was capable of extracting if he was provoked?  No, she had to protect her father and mother at all costs.

“It was an accident.”
  She cringed inwardly when his scowl darkened; outwardly she gave no indication she noticed.  “I know what it sounds like but it’s true.  He…I mean we were in the bedroom…saying good-bye, you know?”  Bri licked her lips nervously, praying he believed the horrendous lie she was about to tell.  “Things got a little heated and that’s when he accidentally tore my blouse.  So you see, you’re getting all worked up for nothing.”

Jake didn’t buy one word of it.
  “Your blouse isn’t torn, Brianne, it’s shredded,” he ground out.  “Now tell me what really happened before I carry you downstairs to face your father and we’ll see if you tell him the same pack of lies you’re telling me.”

A tremor of fear
skittered up her spine.  He wasn’t kidding, he would actually do it!  “All right, I’ll tell you.  But you have to promise you won’t say anything to Daddy.”  Jake didn’t answer one way or the other, but his grasp on her loosened and she figured that was about as close to a promise as she was going to get.  “It wasn’t a complete lie, what I told you.  He…we starting kissing and I guess I pushed him a little too far because he…he lost control and started tearing at my clothes and…and…”  Bri’s eyes filled with tears.  “Please don’t make me tell you rest, Jake.  It’s humiliating enough that it happened at all.  I don’t want to relive it.”

Jake’s expression softened.
  “Did he hurt you?”

“No.
  He…he stopped when I screamed and told him he was acting like an animal.”

Relief briefly overrode his anger.
  “So he didn’t force himself on you?”

She managed a weak smile at the delicate way he was trying to phrase the question.
  “No.  Except for the torn blouse and a few bruises, I’m fine.”

“What bruises?”
he demanded, thunder brewing in his eyes.

Brianne bit her lip.
  “It’s nothing, Jake.”

“Show me.”

Timidly, she pulled her wrists free and held them up for him to see.  After a thorough inspection, his expression was even more grim than before.  He didn’t wait for her to point out the other bruises.  Jake slipped his hands inside the blouse and gently pushed it off her shoulders, his eyes moving over her upper body, pausing now and then with a tight lipped grimace when he spotted another discolored spot on her otherwise perfect skin.  When he was done, Jake drew her into his arms and pressed his cheek to hers.  When he finally spoke, his voice was low and deep and unquestionably deadly.

“If he touches you again, I’ll kill him.”

It was Chad’s good fortune to have left for the airport by the time Jake went looking for him,
although he might have caught up with the coward if he hadn’t held Brianne for so long before ushering her off to her room to change.  He’d taken a few more minutes to call her father to let him know they were running late.  Phillip didn’t ask why they were delayed and Jake offered no explanation.  The he’d slipped out of her room and down the hall, pounding on Chad’s door for several minutes before he finally realized the man was no longer in his room.  By the time he returned to Bri, she had touched up her make-up and changed clothes.

Jake’s gaze swept over the somber outfit; black slacks that were a good two sizes too large with a matching blazer
, and beneath that, a grey and black stripped shirt.  She’d pulled her hair back again, except this time the soft wisps around her face were missing and she looked horribly pale and drawn. 

Her chin jutted forward, her eyes silently challenging him as she’d done before
, but he wasn’t about to make the same mistake twice and tell Bri what he really thought of her new look.  Without a word, she retrieved her briefcase and after a quick stop at his room to gather his things, they took the elevator down to the first floor where the meeting was being held.

Phillip didn’t even break stride in his presentation when Jake and Brianne entered the room and took their places at the table directly in front of the podium.
  His voice was strong and authoritative; his mere presence so commanding that Jake doubted anyone noticed their late arrival.  Bri was immediately drawn into her father’s speech, her eyes lighting up with such obvious adoration as she watched him it tugged at Jake’s heart. 

There was nothing at all pretentious about
this woman; she loved with abandon, spreading her infectious joy for life where ever she went and it had probably never even occurred to her to be any different.  Until that soul-eater, Chad Donahue, wormed his way in and convinced Bri there was something wrong with her.

Why would any man want to take someone as vibrant and full of life as Brianne and change her into something completely different than who she really was?
  It didn’t make sense to him, and it made even less sense that she allowed it to happen.  According to her parents, she was a fighter who took her punches and came back swinging no matter how high the cards were stacked against her.  So why was she giving in so easily now? 

Chad wasn’t even here and she’d folded to his wishes by wearing her hair and clothes in a style that was not only unbecoming, it simply wasn’t Bri.
  Jake hadn’t been around her long enough to know all the changes she'd undergone since her engagement, but her parents were obviously so distraught about if they were willing to enlist his help to put an end to it.  Looking at her now, it wasn’t too difficult to imagine himself usurping Chad’s place in her life.  If she would only let him.

E
ngrossed in listening to her father speak, Bri didn’t notice that Jake hadn’t taken his eyes off her the entire time.  But when the speech ended and she turned to find him staring at her with a sexy grin plastered on his face, the color rose instantly to her cheeks.  Good Lord, what was he thinking of that made his eyes seem so sultry and…
hungry
?  He looked as if he wanted to devour her.  Heaven help her, but Brianne was all too willing to be the sacrificial lamb if Jake was playing the role of the Big Bad Wolf.  Luckily, the overwhelming urge to offer herself up to him was waylaid when her father introduced her to the group of people and asked her to say a few words.

The room was filled with team leaders from the architecture, engineering, landscaping, and construction companies they
had hired, as well as electricians, plumbers and the like, but they weren’t Brianne’s primary concern when she stood before them.  Carrington Cosmetics wasn’t opening one small shop in the middle of an established mall; they were going for something on a much grander scale, and that generally made members of the community a little uneasy.  A major part of her job was to establish a relationship with representatives of the community and keep a favorable line of communication open to ensure the public viewed their project in a positive light.

There were members of the press in attendance, both local and national, and generally speaking if she had the media on her side, getting the members of the community to understand what a benefit the project would be wasn’t very difficult.
  She spoke passionately about the string of shops that would cater to the female population of Jackson, pointing out the advantages of having all their specialty stores housed so closely together.

There would be boutiques that exclusively carried the Carrington cosmetics, but there would also be hair and nail salons, as well as health spas where women could have facials and full-body massages or simply relax in a whirlpool with her friends.
  There would even be a licensed day-care center for those women who never seemed to be able to find a baby-sitter so they could pamper themselves.

Bri had done
extensive research for months before they decided Jackson was ripe for this kind of service, and her belief in her father’s company made her speech as compelling as Phillip’s had been.  She listed the benefits, not just for the patrons but for those seeking job opportunities and ended with a question and answer session.  This was where Bri excelled; her natural ability to connect on a personal level with both men and women, combined with a sharp wit, provided the necessary skills to respond to the rapid fire questions in a way that seemed to quell any doubts about the project as quickly as they arose.  She shined and she knew it, and by the time she stepped down from the podium, the self confidence that had been so effectively squashed by Chad that morning returned with a vengeance.

Phillip rose from the table and gave her a big hug before returning to the podium to introduce the next speaker, Andy Sutton, of the Sutton Architectural Firm.
  As the head of Marketing and Design, Jake was responsible for selecting the teams that would raise the Carrington Cosmetics complex from the ground up, and that included Andy, whose services were next to impossible to obtain without waiting a solid year.

She was impressed that
 Jake had somehow managed to persuade Andy to take on this project personally with only a six month lead in, as well as pulling off a few major miracles with some of the other contractors.  Her father was lucky to have Jake.  Bri smiled to herself.  She was damn lucky to have him too.

“I
would kill to know what’s going on inside that pretty head of yours right now,” Jake whispered.

Bri turned her head, drawing in a sharp breath to find his mouth so close to hers.
  “Would you believe me if I said the project?”

His eyes danced with amusement.
  “Not a chance in hell, sweetheart.  I’ve seen that smile in the early morning light; it has nothing to do with work and everything to do with pleasure.”

She remembered all too well the pleasure of lying next to him, beneath him, drowning in his masculine scent and enjoying every minute of it.
  Bri turned away from him, desperately trying to look irritated but it wasn’t easy.  He was way too handsome for his own good and far too arrogant, but it was hard to ignore the way he made her pulse race or the tingling feeling that came over her whenever he was near. 

She did her best to ignore him during the rest of the presentation, and afterwards she was too busy mingling with everyone else to think about anything but the project and doing her job.
  She even managed to avoid sitting next to him at lunch and then accepted a ride from Andy Sutton when they all went out to the project site.  He didn’t catch up with her again until they arrived back at the hotel and were headed up to their rooms to rest for a few hours before attending another dinner party.

“I feel a little frostbitten,” he said as they stepped into the elevator.

Bri kept her eyes leveled on the elevator doors.  “It is a bit chilly outside, but I didn’t think it was that cold.”

“I wasn’t talking about the weather, I was talking about you.”

The doors slid open and she made a hasty exit, but Jake was right on her heels.  “I don’t know what you mean.”  She stopped in front of her suite and fumbled through her purse for the cardkey.  “I…I’ll see you at dinner,” she said without turning around.

“You’re not going to invite me in?”

“Please Jake, I can’t…I just can’t.”

His hands came up, gliding over her shoulders and down her arms and making her shiver.
  “Can’t what,” he said softly, “can’t even talk to me or be friends?”

“Is that really all you want?”

“It’s enough for now.”

Bri pushed the door open.
  Inviting him in would be a huge mistake if he was lying because it wasn’t enough for her and never would be.  She turned in the doorway and faced him.  “I’m marrying Chad.”

He took a step forward.
  “I know.”

“I won’t change my mind.”

He took another step and then another until he’d backed her into the room and the door had closed behind them.  “I’m not trying to change your mind.”

She looked up at him, letting her briefcase drop to the floor.
  “Jake…” 

His briefcase thudded to the floor beside hers, a primal growl of want and need rumbling deep in his chest as he grabbed her up in his arms and ground his mouth against hers.
  Her head was spinning, her heart rate escalating at an alarming pace until she thought it would burst.  Her fingers sifted through his hair, her body arching into his as she fed hungrily on his mouth, the taste of him so divine she felt drunk from it. 

She wanted him.
  No, she
needed
him, needed him more than she needed her next breath.  Heat surged through her body and pooled deep in her abdomen, a searing reminder of the places only Jake had touched, places that ached to feel his touch again.

“You want me,” he rasped.

It was a statement not a question, but she answered breathlessly, “Yes, yes.”

His lips grazed along her jaw, her neck, sliding down to suckle the spot on her throat where Bri’s pulse throbbed out her need for him.
  “You’re driving me crazy,” he murmured against her soft skin. 

“It’s no more than you do to me.”

Jake lifted his head, peering deep into those sea blue eyes of hers.  “But you’re still going to marry Donahue.”

It was like having a glass of ice water tossed into her face.
  “Yes.”  

“Because you love him?”

Tears stung her eyes.  The answer he expected was yes, but she wouldn’t lie to him.  “Because it’s too late, it’s gone too far.”

The defeated
in voice twisted in his gut like a knife.  “Why?  Just because your engagement was announced and the invitations have gone out?  So you retract them both and that cold-hearted fiancé of yours suffers a few months of embarrassment, what’s the big deal?”

Bri leaned into him, pressing her cheek against the corded muscles of his chest, the contrast between his incredible strength and her own weakness so acute she could have cried for the unfairness of it all.
  If it was Jake she was marrying there would be joy in her heart not dread.  She would be laughing and smiling and shouting it from the rooftops instead of wishing she could slink into the nearest dark closet and hide herself there forever.  But it wasn’t Jake, it was Chad she would be spending the rest of her life with and she had to start accepting that.

“I can’t back out of it,” she said flatly.
  “Too many people would get hurt if I did.”

His brows furrowed.
  “I’m sure they would rather see you happy, Bri, and you won’t be if you go through with this.”

Tilting her head back, she gave him a sad smile.
  “You don’t understand and I can’t explain it.  Can’t we just leave it at that?”

Jake studied her face for a moment.
  “He has something on you, doesn’t he?  Something he’s using to blackmail you into marrying him.”

Her laugh was short and bitter.
  “That’s the most ironic part.  He has nothing at all so it’s impossible to choose which weapons to draw.  Give it up, Jake, it’s a losing battle.”

“You’re wrong,” he said softly, “it’s only a losing battle if you don’t put up a fight.
  Don’t take this one lying down, Bri.  Trust me, you have too much at stake.”

With that, he pressed a kiss to her lips then turned and left the room.
  Brianne had never felt so utterly alone in her life.          

 
                                                              ***

“It’s not going to be as easy as we hoped,” Jake told her parents a few minutes later when he joined them in the hotel restaurant.

Phillip nodded to a waiter who immediately produced an extra glass and poured the wine for Jake.  “You seemed so sure she has feelings for you.”

“I still am, but Donahue has something on her
.  Bri as much as admitted it, but wouldn’t tell me what it was.”